But.
Look at that word. That is a beautiful word. If I had to choose just one word which every writer should include in every page of every chapter, it is hands down the word, ‘but’.
I really like buts.
Those three letters can turn a sentence on its head and make your story so much more interesting. I'm so excited; let's try this out right now. First we need a suitably bland sentence:
The cat sat on the mat.
There is nothing wrong with this sentence. It tells you what you need to know: that there is a cat, there is a mat, and the former sits on the latter. Fine. But we’re telling a story. Great stories have twists, and lots of them. Let's stick a ‘but’ on the end.
The cat sat on the mat, but…
The possibilities are endless. But… the mat was covered in marmalade. But… the mat had been placed over a hole. But… the mat was just a figment of the cat's imagination.
This simple little word forces you to invent, and it is this principle for imagining the unexpected which should be absorbed into your subconscious. If a paragraph is bland or the story seems slow and uninteresting, stick a ‘but’ in there somewhere, and watch it come to life.
What we don't want to do is use it so often that it draws attention to itself, BUT your readers don't have to know if you're clever about it. There are many other variations we can use instead.
The cat sat on the mat, even though/despite the fact there was a lizard already sunbathing on it.
The cat sat on the mat. However, it quickly jumped up again when it saw the mouse scuttling across the floor.
So we've seen how it works in sentences. Now, let's see how we can apply it to other things. I'm talking about characters, plot, locations, weather, history… everything.
If the cat is our main character, we don't want it to be one-dimensional, so it needs fleshing out. It needs flaws as well as claws, so let's give it a short bio.
Cat: The housepet of an old woman. It would have a great life, if not for the pesky little mouse which taunts it daily.
Note the use of ‘if not’ in place of ‘but’. The more of these you write about the cat, the more real it will seem. Let's do some more.
House: A small terraced house. Unfortunately, the old woman has not been keeping up with repairs and there are lots of leaks and damp spots in the ceiling which sometimes drip on the cat when it's napping.
Weather: The British summer has been one of the hottest in years - to the cat's dismay. It hates the heat almost as much as cold baths, which the old woman insists on once a week.
In the end, it's not really the word ‘but’ that's important. What's important is that you're thinking about conflict, which should probably be the true title of this chapter. Conflict makes a character's life hell, and it is the most powerful way to inject excitement into your story and get readers coming back.
But you probably already knew that.